4 Content Marketing Shifts for 2025

Like everything, content marketing is constantly shifting and adapting to new audience behaviours and expectations. It can be challenging to keep up. If you’re thinking of ways you can help your work break through this year, we’re breaking down 4 shifts in content marketing in this blog and how you can put these into action.

Focus on Original, Unique Content

AI’s influence has been a focal point for many in content marketing since generative AI emerged as a viable option for content creation. AI can create content that is thorough and informative and plentiful. But a big shift in 2025 is a focus on content that stands out from the rest in a way that is harder for AI to produce, and that’s authoritative content that leverages subject matter experts and unique perspectives to a brand. This kind of content will help you stand out in the crowd and provide insights that are going to be ownable to you and fresh for your audience. 

In a lot of ways, this is a return to the days of old for content marketing; blogs that were unique perspectives on a number of different topics, giving voices to help reach new audiences and engage existing customers. Generative AI has in many ways brought us back to this moment where authentic and original content began. It’s less about the volume of pieces and more about real and insightful content that reflects your brand, your product or service offering and your perspective, allowing your audience to engage with content that is uniquely yours. 

Here’s the thing – this kind of content takes longer to produce, in general. But its value in your content marketing plan is worth the investment. Spending the time and effort on a piece that demonstrates your unique POV and insight will position you well with your audience. 

If everyone has access to generative AI, it’s a rat race to expect pushing out content in large volume without your unique lens is going to add value to your marketing efforts and value to your audiences. Finding ways to differentiate your content from the competition means stepping outside of the quality-over-quantity race to refocus on leveraging your insights, your data, and your experience in the content you produce. If someone else could use generative AI to produce the same thing, it’s not worth doing. 

Another aspect of this is the focus on tangible and real. This is where leveraging your data, knowledge, personal experience for connection, and expertise comes into play. And again, generative AI can’t write that blog for you from start to finish. Dig into your data and your team’s wealth of knowledge to find unique angles on topics that are important to your marketing efforts and your business. Use graphics and attention-grabbing visuals to illustrate these for readers in ways that are shareable across platforms. Find real numbers and real takeaways from real examples to demonstrate insight. The result is value for the reader they couldn’t have gotten elsewhere. Think outside the box with where you get the insights from – maybe it’s internal surveys, chats with your team, reporting, brainstorming sessions. 

Keep the big question in mind when you’re creating your content calendar: what are you adding to the conversation? If it’s redundant, and you’re not adding anything new, maybe you need to reconsider your approach.

Here’s how to do it:

• Find your topic and then land on your unique perspective. What insight do you bring to the table? What subject matter experts do you have on your team that you could interview and bring to the piece? What value can this originality bring to your audience? 
• Review recent case studies or projects and data you have to help tell an interesting story that aligns with your content strategy. 
• Speak from a personal angle. Your audience is seeking personal connection more than ever. Sharing a personal perspective, while on the surface feeling niche, might help you relate to the audience more.

Answer Engine Optimization & Website Content

We ask Google everything and organic results are displayed based on search engine optimization. SEO remains a critical piece of the puzzle, but finding information online is getting easier thanks to answer engines. Most searches now in Google will result in an AI overview, taking up valuable space above the fold in search results. 

Both answer engines and AI overviews include citations now, and another avenue for users to find you online and come to your site. This is another avenue to leverage search engines for both brand awareness and ideally traffic to your website. 

Take advantage of this opportunity when you’re building content for your website. The question-and-answer approach is what answer engines hinge on and aligns with what users are searching for. Focusing on important topics to your brand that align with what users are searching for and then using simple, conversational answers in your content with help set you up for success.

Here’s how to do it:

• A solid technical SEO foundation for your website is key here because it comes back to organic visibility. 
• Consider an FAQ section on key pages that will help you work in a question-and-answer format on your site without breaking the flow of your content.
• Use keyword research and mapping to understand keyword opportunities based on-page topics.

AI & Content Creation

AI does have a place in how we approach content marketing in 2025, but the shift is how we use it. Instead of approaching these from the angle of producing content, AI tools can help you save time and do more with less, from ideating topics for blogs, to resizing images for digital platforms.

Think of the time-consuming tasks that you encounter as you work through your content marketing strategy and content calendar. Maybe it’s brainstorming new ideas, resizing images, or creating infographics based on the unique data you’ve uncovered for an article. Tools you’re already using may have new AI features you may or may not already know about, so look there first to see if there’s a solution you can leverage. If not, look outside your current toolbox for a solution that might help you streamline your workflow. 

The benefit of using AI tools to help you save time means it frees you and your team up to spend that time in more valuable places – like creating original content that helps you stand out in the crowd. 

Here’s how to do it:

• Test a new tool for the more cumbersome parts of your content work. Maybe it’s ideation or maybe it’s an AI tool that helps you resize images for multiple platforms.
• Be transparent with your team and your external stakeholders when AI is used in the production of work – i.e. ‘AI was used in the brainstorming phase of this video series’. 
• Focus on using your time where it’s most valuable; in creating the content you’re putting out with your unique perspective as discussed above. Use AI tools to make you more efficient but leave the creating to you and your team.

AI Transparency & Education in Content Creation

In 2025 AI is not the elephant in the room that we’re not talking about openly anymore. In our industry, most marketers are using AI to some extent in their workflows, but how we use it and being transparent about this is the shift we’re seeing in 2025 and for good reason. As we as an industry and on a larger scale a society understand the pros and cons of AI, coming from a place of transparency will set you up for success by building trust with your internal and external stakeholders. It shows you’re being thoughtful and considerate about how you use AI, and that you’re educated on the tools you’re using and their outputs. This is important for internal teams and customers. For content creation, transparency in when and where AI tools are used in your process is important. 

Experiment with new things and share your findings internally and externally. Your curiosity and openness about this will reflect transparency and dedication to education to your audiences that creates trust and helps you keep pace with the ever-evolving AI technology space.

Here’s how to do it:

• Use Internal guidelines for how AI tools are used and how this is communicated to your audiences.
• Ask partners and contractors how they use AI. 
• Try some tests internally with AI tools and share the results with your team. Share the pros and cons of the test and the takeaways.
• Share openly internally and externally about AI and how different teams and partners use it to learn more.

Final Takeaway

This last takeaway isn’t really a trend, but more so a habit we highly recommend: stay on top of trends and your knowledge. Make it a habit to research how things are changing and how you can adapt your efforts. Push forward with trial and error; it’s not all going to work, but you’ll know more than before you started. Be open to new ideas and change your approach when you need to.

And if you need help along the way, reach out to us. We’re here to help.